


MISSED CALLS

by lingeringflowers



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, LITERALLY PLATONIC, TommyInnit - Freeform, Tubbo - Freeform, Warden!Sam, all my homies hate dsmp!dream, basically just tubbo character development, cause tommy cant pick up hehe, clingyduo, clingyduo but make it really sad, god i did NOT mean to make this 3200 words, missed calls hehe get it cause, no beta we literally die like tommy, skype is canon on the dream smp fight me, tubbo and ranboo are platonically married, tubbo is science nerd because i said so, tubbo learns how to grieve, what am i without you?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:02:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29835735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lingeringflowers/pseuds/lingeringflowers
Summary: Tubbo calls Tommy on Skype every Sunday.Sometimes they only chat for half an hour. Some days its five or six. Tubbo calls Tommy every Sunday without fail. One day, Tommy doesn’t pick up.
Relationships: Tommyinnit & Tubbo
Comments: 16
Kudos: 111
Collections: Completed stories I've read





	MISSED CALLS

Tubbo calls Tommy on Skype every Sunday. It’s kind of their thing, with Skype being the only way to communicate long-distance. Ever since the war ended, the two went off down their separate paths- Tubbo to improve Snowchester, and Tommy to do… whatever the hell he does. It's perfect for their busy schedules. Tubbo rings Tommy at exactly 9:00 PM GMT, and Tommy picks up, just one minute after. He’s precise that way.

Sometimes they only chat for half an hour. Some days it's five or six. But Tubbo remains consistent, calling Tommy every week without fail.

Of course, when they can, they meet up. They take long strolls down the prime path and sit on the bench, mindlessly watching the sun set, reminiscent of the days before conflict. Tommy makes the trip to Snowchester when he can, sometimes stringing Ranboo along with him. The three boys perform experiments in Tubbo’s makeshift lab and steal from Captain Puffy. She never seems to mind.

It's nice, Tubbo thinks, being able to make mistakes and experience joy again, without all the pain. Afterall, Dream is in Pandora’s box, locked away from the world. He can’t hurt anyone, least of all Tubbo and his friends. Things are good, and Tubbo thinks they'll stay that way for a very long time.

It’s Sunday, 9:00 PM GMT.

_Ring_. Tubbo starts counting. Before he can get to two, he hears-

“-What is UP TUBZO!” Tubbo can’t stop the grin appearing on his face, Tommy on time and obnoxiously loud as usual.

Tommy didn’t wait for a response.

“Tubbo, listen, I have been fucking busy, man, lemme tell you. Sam Nook, the only man in the world, he is giving me tasks and shit. God, it’s for my hotel, but it's bloody hard!” Tommy complained, his sharp accent leaking through the shitty connection.

Tubbo barked with laughter. “Tommy, you complain about something new every time I call you.”

“Yea, well you call me once a week! Seven days, bitch! Of course I complain!” Tommy defended himself.

“Oh, so you miss me?” Tubbo taunted. His chest felt warm, it always did when he talked with Tommy. Tommy gave him warmth in the cold of Snowchester.

“I- EXCUSE ME?!” Tommy was full-on shouting, his words slurring together. “You're the clingy one, you dick!”

Tubbo could barely contain his laughter. This seemed to anger Tommy further.

“Tubbo, I…. am a Big Man. I do not _miss_ people, least of all your clingy ass,” Tommy boasted haughtily. 

“Of course you don’t,” Tubbo mockingly agreed.

The two boys continued to chat on the phone, poking fun of each other. Tommy teased Tubbo for his weird commune, because _who has fucking nukes, the fuck?_ Tubbo retaliated by flaming Tommy about his excess of red flowers in his chests. 

_“There for Sam! For the hotel!”_

_“Rightttttt.”_

Sundays became Tubbo’s favorite day of the week. Also Wednesday’s, because that’s when Ranboo came to visit Snowchester. But Sundays, they gave him hope. They made him smile after a particularly frustrating science-experiment-gone-wrong. Every time Tubbo felt like shit, felt the pit of dread return to his stomach, refused to get out of bed, he knew he could rely on Sunday’s to pull him through the week. 

_Click._

_Ring._

_One-_

“Hello Tubbo!” came Tommy’s garbled voice through the receiver.

“Tommy! Wow, your connection is really shit.”

“Yea, sorry ‘bout that. You caught me at a bad time. I can’t talk for long big man, ‘cause I’m on a fuckin adventure!” Tommy’s voice rose severa octaves with those words. Tubbo could just make out the sound of laughter in the background.

“Sounds fun! Is that Sam with you?”

“Yeaaa, he dragged me along this trip of his, said he _needed me_ or some bullshit,” Tommy sounded like he was only pretending to be annoyed.

“Anyways, I’ve got to go, but soon-”

The connection tampered out, leaving Tubbo in silence.

“-how does that sound Tubbo?”

Tubbo sighed, knowing he wasn’t going to get much out of this conversation.

“I have to go Tommy! Talk to you soon, yea?” He lied.

“Yea man! See you ar-”

And he was gone. Tubbo’s shoulders deflated. He was disappointed, but he knew Tommy had a life outside of their weekly calls at 9 PM GMT. Tubbo did too, he would be fine. Tubbo would talk to him next week, things would stay the same.

The week inched by. Tubbo tried his best to keep himself busy with mindless tasks. On Tuesday, he exploded his lab materials for fun, not even bothering to jot down the results. Wednesday crawled its way in, bringing Ranboo with it. By the time Saturday rolled around, Tubbo was ready to pull his hair out from boredom and loneliness. _Was he lonely?_ Snowchester, as beautiful as it was, could be rather… empty at times. Sure, people visited, but not to see _him_. Their visits were fleeting, hurried even, only allowing room for small talk and goodbyes. 

But Tubbo wasn’t lonely. He knew that, because how could he be? How could he be, when he had Tommy? 

The sun rose to greet Sunday, and Tubbo smiled. Today was a good day. Tommy had been gone on his trip with Sam, but he had to be back now, ready to answer Tubbo’s call when the time came. 

The sun dragged its way across the sky, flitting behind clouds, until finally kissing the horizon. 

It had been a really productive day for Tubbo. He had gathered wood for new construction projects, _finally_ cleaned up his disaster of a laboratory, and was generally in a good mood.

He fished out his device that only had Skype and Spotify on it- Ranboo forced Tubbo to get it so they could listen to each other’s music- and Tubbo clicked the Skype icon.

_TOMMYINNIT (Big Man)_ , was the contact that Tubbo clicked on.

He pulled the device up to his ear and waited, strumming his fingers against his thigh.

_Click._

_Ring._

_One-_

_Two._

Tommy always picked up after the first ring. No sooner, no later. He was very precise that way.

Tubbo briefly wondered if his device was broken, so he closed out of the app and tried again, ringing Tommy once more.

_Click._

_Ring._

_One-_

_Two._

Why the fuck wasn’t Tommy picking up?

_Click._

_“Hey, It’s Tommyinnit. Big T. Huge man. Wife-haver. *Laughter*. Yeaaa that’s me, sorry I can’t answer your call right now, I’m off talking to girls on Snapchat. Don’t be clingy. I’ll call back later. Leave a message, don’t be a dick.”_

_Click._

Tubbo pressed _1_ to leave a message.

_Click_.

“Hey, Tommy, it’s Tubbo. Just checking, it's Sunday 9 PM for you right? Because it’s currently 9:03 here and you are never late… you okay big man? Call me.” 

_Click._

But Tubbo wasn’t satisfied. Worry drilled holes into his brain, making his blood pump faster and his hands shake. 

It had been a week. It was Sunday, right? Sundays were Skype Days. Tubbo always called and Tommy always answered.

Tubbo checked the calendar and the time, and then checked them again.

Tommy was never late to these calls, ever. Even if he was too busy to talk one day, he still answered the phone to let Tubbo know.

Tubbo began to pace, the snow crunching softly against his boots. His mind raced, immediately jumping to harsh conclusions. He tugged on the neck of his green jumper, a nervous habit. _What if something happened on their adventure?_ No. Sam would keep Tommy safe, no matter what. _What if something happened to Sam?_

Tubbo’s head began to pound. His thoughts were so loud, rattling inside his brain like ping pong balls with no direction to go in.

He had to find someone, ask someone, he needed to know if Tommy was okay.

Tubbo thumbed through his contacts, finding Sam’s first. 

_AWESAMDUDE (The Warden)_ it read.

_Click._

_Ring._

Tubbo started counting out of habit, before realizing not everyone answered calls like Tommy.

After the fourth ring, Sam picked up. 

“Hello?” His voice was rough on the receiver.

“Sam, it's Tubbo. I- I’m just calling to ask about Tommy… he’s supposed to answer my Skype calls at 9:01 PM GMT every Sunday… are you with him?” The question hung in the air.

Sam took eons to respond. Tubbo waited with bated breath, every second leeching the air out of his lungs.

“Tubbo… I- I don’t know how to tell you this,” Sam’s voice was low, dejected.

“Tell me what?”

“Tommy got stuck in the prison on Friday. With Dream. It was an accident, he was only supposed to visit one last time. And well, they… fought. Tommy lost. He-” Sam’s voice broke. “He died, Tubbo.”

Sam continued to speak, but Tubbo couldn’t hear it. Blood roared in his ears, setting his brain aflame. Tommy was _dead? No, he couldn’t be._ Tubbo wanted to throw up. He was choking on his own thoughts, his own words, no sound escaping his lips. He stared ahead, unblinking, mouth open in a silent scream. He could barely register the rest of Sam’s explanation, only catching bits of a _security risk_ , and _protocol_ , and _my fault_.

Tubbo couldn’t breathe. This wasn’t real, this couldn’t be real. It must be a dream, he had to be sleeping, it was Saturday night, and tomorrow he would wake up and call Tommy. 

Tubbo pinched himself, drawing blood. 

He didn’t wake up. 

He knew Sam was waiting for a response from him, but he couldn’t speak. His words were like rocks lodged in his throat, shredding his vocal chords. 

_“I’m sorry Tubbo,”_ Was the last thing he heard before he passed out, alone in the snow.

Tubbo wasn’t sure who found him. He wasn’t sure who carried him into his warm cabin and laid him to rest. He wasn’t sure of anything, really. He clung to reality like he clung to his bedsheets, thin and worn.

Living had become a nightmare. So he tried to sleep. But even his subconscious was plagued with memories of Him. He always stood, blonde hair glinting in the sun, laughing loudly. Tubbo always woke up choking on his tears. 

Tubbo lost his sense of time. He became blind to morning and night; days slipped away from him and weeks deteriorated. Every second he was awake he was plunged underwater, underground. He felt like someone had sucked all the happiness from his life and held it just out of reach, taunting him.

Ranboo was there to comfort him, for the most part. Comfort was foreign to Tubbo these days. He didn’t even register days anymore. He lived life in his bare room. There used to be photographs adorning the walls, but Tubbo had smashed them after a particularly horrible dream. He hated feeling this way, he hated feeling hopeless and lost, but he didn’t know how to stop. His mind was muddled with misdirection and he never knew which way was up. 

He was drowning on land.

Tubbo just wanted it to be over. He didn’t know what, exactly, but he wanted it done with. The pain, the guilt. The loneliness. He just wanted it to stop.

Winter turned to Spring, and Tubbo had never felt worse. Tommy loved flowers, so seeing them grow through the melting snow in Snowchester made Tubbo want to black out. His heart was constantly on fire, missing its other half. He stayed in his room still, closing the blinds to block out the sun.

Tommy had been the light on the server. He was the sun, moon, and stars all rolled into one. Tubbo’s light had left him, plunging him into eternal darkness.

Spring brought flowers, but it also brought rain. Ranboo tried convincing Tubbo that new growth represented hope, change. Tubbo resented him for it. 

He hadn’t touched his communicator in months. He couldn’t bear to look at it, for it was a reminder of something unattainable. Skype was a trivial desire, childish in the grand scheme of things.

_The grand scheme. Fucking hell._ Dream had really done a number on Tubbo and Tommy. He had ruined the two of them, utterly crushing their hopes and dreams. Tubbo recalled a chess game he had once played against the masked man, when he saw the two of them as friends. Tubbo lost. 

_“So are you accepting this?”_

_“It's alright. We had some laughs! It was fun…. but all things must come to an end eventually.”_

_“What am I without you?”_

_“Yourself.”_

_“As he described me as a pawn, this is checkmate. This is it, this is the end. I suggest you resign.”_

The lines echoed through Tubbo’s head, sending him reeling. _Checkmate_. God, he hated the parallels of it all. Dream, the ultimate reason, defeated their King. They had lost, and with it, lost Tommy.

Tommy was never supposed to die. It was always going to be Tubbo, or at least he had thought so. Tubbo had remained optimistic throughout the disc war, but it was all a facade for Tommy. Internally, he knew only one of them could make it out alive. He knew it and Dream knew it. So Tubbo had given up. He had poured his heart and soul into his friendships and projects, and when the time came, he was ready to let go. _It should’ve been me._

Spring melted into Summer, setting Tubbo’s hellish mind aflame. He hated Summer, it being the season he used to spend the most time with Tommy. 

Tubbo found himself being drawn to old tokens of his. He spent days digging through his drawers, tossing memorabilia of L’manberg aside, merely focusing on Tommy’s things, Tommy’s memories. He still missed him greatly, and this practice made it arguably ten times worse. Or perhaps it was therapeutic. Tubbo couldn’t tell the difference between self-destructive tendencies and healthy habits anymore.

One afternoon he was sorting through a chest, and found his familiar old communicator. He had never gotten a new one, resorting to talking to people in person. It was rather difficult, and made his situation lonelier, but Tubbo couldn’t care.

He studied the device. It was dusty, he wasn’t even sure it would turn on. He wasn’t sure he wanted it to.

But his curiosity got the best of him, and he found a charging cable to use. Blinking white lights told him it worked, and soon the painfully familiar blue Skype icon appeared.

Without thinking, he opened it up and clicked on Tommy’s icon. Hesitating, he knew this was stupid. But what did he have to lose?

_Click._

_Ring._

Tubbo couldn’t stop himself from counting.

_One-_

_Two-_

_Three-_

_Four-_

_Five-_

_Click._

_“Hey, It’s Tommyinnit. Big T. Huge man. Wife-haver. *Laughter*. Yeaaa that’s me, sorry I can’t answer your call right now, I’m off talking to girls on Snapchat. Don’t be clingy. I’ll call back later. Leave a message, don’t be a dick.”_

_Click._

Tubbo felt his stomach fill with lead. Tears filled his eyes. He shook at the sound of Tommy’s accent. _God, he had missed that voice._ He hated to think he had almost forgotten what it sounded like.

Tubbo’s hands moved of his own accord, pressing _1._

_Click._

_“Hey Tommy. You won’t get this. And that fucking sucks. I don’t even know why I’m doing this right now. You would call me clingy for it. Can- can you call me clingy again? Just one more time mate… that’s all. Its stupid, I know. It's pathetic, a guy talking to his dead best friend on bloody Skype. Fuck. You're dead. Goddamn, the cold slap of reality. It's a bitch, I’ll tell ya. Listen, Tommy. I- I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I’m sorry you had to die at the hands of Him. I- I miss you, Tommyinnit. Because- because I am nothing, without you.”_

Tubbo wanted to continue, but he wasn’t sure he could. His heart was breaking all over again, every emotion flooding his senses at once. He wanted to cry, cry over his lost best friend. But he also felt an odd sense of peace, relief. Tubbo had finally conquered something that had been festering in his mind since Winter. It was somehow freeing.

Tubbo picked back up his Skype schedule. Every Sunday, ringing Tommyinnit, at 9 PM GMT, without fail. Every Sunday, counting until he heard Tommy’s voice come through. Every Sunday, sending him a message he could never respond to.

Sometimes he cried. He poured out all his feelings, his anger and bitterness. He would scream at the world, met with silence. 

Other times he told Tommy about his day. He told Tommy about Ranboo, and the hotel they were building- _its not a competition, I promise-_ and the weird kid they adopted- _you would like him, his name’s Micheal._

Of course, it didn’t matter what Tubbo said, Tommy would never hear it. 

Every Sunday was the same. It became _Tommy Day,_ which made Tubbo sort of mad, because he knew he shouldn’t be so fixated on his _dead best friend._ Plus, if Tommy was alive, he would never shut up about how he had a _whole day to himself!_ Fucking prick.

Tubbo was growing. He grew like the limbs in the forest, the occasional crack in the bark. He grew like the flowers in spring, watered by his own tears, struggling to push through the last of winter’s snow. But he was growing nonetheless. 

Tubbo started to forget to call. 9 PM on Sunday would slip by without a glance. The first time it happened, Tubbo felt so guilty he cried himself to sleep. Now, it's just a slight twinge of regret, reminding him to do better. 

Nowadays, Tubbo doesn’t care if he forgets. He truly only calls for big stuff, like birthdays, or holidays, or major life updates.

_“Tommy, Ranboo and I are getting married!”_

Tubbo knew Tommy would’ve teased them endlessly for that one.

Sunday was still _Tommy Day_ , but more subtle. Tubbo had taken to planting and caring for red flowers in Snowchester on Sunday’s. They were his prized possession. 

Months slipped by, fading away, leaving Tubbo less and less alone. Grieving had always been peculiar for Tubbo. He never really learned how to handle it, only picking up tricks from Tommy.

_“Count backwards from 10, slowly.”_

Tubbo did. It helped.

But Tubbo was learning how to do things without Tommy. Even in death, Tommy had been the biggest impact on Tubbo, the reason for everything he did. Frankly, Tubbo was sick of it. He was sick of the grief, the pain. He wanted to be free of it. Not free of Tommy, no. Simply free of his hellish mind that came with Tommy’s death.

So he did. Tubbo decided to send one last message to Tommy. A final farewell.

_Click._

_Ring._

Tubbo didn’t count.

_Click._

_“Hey, It’s Tommyinnit. Big T. Huge man. Wife-haver. *Laughter*. Yeaaa that’s me, sorry I can’t answer your call right now, I’m off talking to girls on Snapchat. Don’t be clingy. I’ll call back later. Leave a message, don’t be a dick.”_

_Click._

He pressed _1._

_Click._

_“Tommy. Hey Big man. I’m just calling to uh, say goodbye. Shocking, I know. Who would’ve thought clingy ol’ Tubbo could let go? But, it's for the best mate. I need to move on. Your death was the worst thing that ever happened to me. I want to be better again, alright? I need to be okay again. So this is my last message, okay? Don’t be upset, you’ll be fine. And so will I. It's time, okay? It's time to let go. Everything must come to an end eventually…._

_…. Goodbye Big T. I love you.”_

_Click._

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> this one. HURT to write. (also, if you couldnt tell i like naming fics after songs lol. first undertale and now mac miller)  
> anyways hope you enjoyed!! :D


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